Lorihadams-- hi guys...been busy!

[keljonma]

A small chub of goat cheese goes for $4-$9 here! .. Price depending on size, additional flavors (herbs) and origin of the cheese.

One of our librarians makes goat cheese. Occasionally she barters, but says she can't sell.

We don't have goats... yet. I personally like Saanens, Nubians, Toggenburgs and Alpines.

 

[lorihadams]

We still can't come to an agreement on breed....he wants to have at least one Tennesse fainter for his own amusement

Thursday

Rain, rain, and more rain. We were able to get 4 of the 5 pine trees down successfully yesterday evening. One big one to go and then we have to do cleanup...yuck! Two of the trees are pretty good but we'll have to cut up the other 3 to get them out of the yard. We felled the other two into the woods, they were close enough. I wish I had my camera on me, Chad looked like a monkey climbing those trees to get a rope up high enough for us to pull them where we wanted them with the atv. My kids were laughing like crazy at their daddy! We were about to get started on the last tree when the heavens opened up and we had to bail. There was a break in the rain long enough this morning to go out and feed everyone and clean the pens, check on Maggie (she's getting close to breeding time--been bleeding 6 or 7 days now and finally showing signs of interest) Tonka sure is happy about it!

Got an email from a local homeschooling group today and it sounds like it might be a fun thing to do. Their kids sure stay busy! They usually meet a little far away but we still might try to swing it because there is nobody out here with children my age. I feel better about what I want to do now so that is a relief. Sometimes it is just nice to have some positive reinforcement, you know? Chad and my mom think I need to be more structured with the kids but I don't think they are ready for a "lets sit down and do schoolwork" type approach just yet. They are only 4 and 2, let them have fun and relax! I tend to be the minority, though.

Oh, almost forgot, Granny called me yesterday to tell me that they were signing a contract on the 15 acres of land that they went and looked at. The good news is that it is zoned A1 so they can move their doublewide on it and live there while they decide about building another house!!! It is such a relief to know that they have that option. We were afraid they would have to be out of the other property before they could get another house built and now they can just move the doublewide and relax a bit.

My mom and dad have gone nuts about it, and not in a good way. I don't understand it because they were all excited about it and then bam, 2 days later and they think it is horrible. I told Granny that if she and Papa were happy with the property then buy it, it's her money and she has to live there, not my mother and sometimes she just has to do what she wants and not what mama wants. I love my mother but she can sure be manipulative sometimes.

 

[lorihadams]

Friday

Woke up to more gloomy weather. Supposed to rain later on tonight and all weekend long.... Someday we'll get the pine trees done....

Got up this morning and looked through my bread machine recipe book and Keljonma and Peddler are inspiring me to try again. I think if I let the machine do all the mixing and rising and stuff and then transfer the dough to regular pans to bake I might have better luck. I have the machine so I may as well use it, right?

Cleaned out the chicken coop a little and the rabbit hutch got cleaned this morning as well, new bedding and everything. Also cleaned out Hammy's cage and gave him some carrot strips (I give him the outside strips that I take off with the vegetable peeler). The kids love to help me clean the hamster cage cause then they get to play with him and watch him roll around in his ball all over the house.

Vacuumed the house and mopped the floors, my BF and her dh and dd are coming over for lasagna tonight. We are going to have a Wii bowling and tennis tournament for the adults while the kids play in Tyler and Maddie's rooms.

I finished All Flesh is Grass last night and now I am starting Harvest: A Year in the Life of an Organic Farm by Nicola Smith. It looked interesting so I picked it up at the library and after that it is on to The Fate of Family Farming by Ronald Jager.

There is a line from All Flesh is Grass that I love and wanted to share. "I sit there, bees around me, earthworms below me, and I wonder why humans can't seem to see how easy life could be if only we would let it be." He goes on to say "I sit at the top point of the pasture hill, look over my little domain, and wonder why I have been so blessed to be here and blessed even more by knowing for certain that I do not want to be anywhere else."

If you haven't read it yet, please do.

 

[keljonma]

Sounds like you've been busy! I bet your granny is glad to have found a piece of land she can call home.

There is a line from All Flesh is Grass that I love and wanted to share. "I sit there, bees around me, earthworms below me, and I wonder why humans can't seem to see how easy life could be if only we would let it be." He goes on to say "I sit at the top point of the pasture hill, look over my little domain, and wonder why I have been so blessed to be here and blessed even more by knowing for certain that I do not want to be anywhere else."

Don'cha just love Gene Logsdon's writing?

You might want to try Louis Bromfield's books, if you can find them in your library system.

 

[lorihadams]

Cool, I'll look for Bromfeld next!

Monday

Well, been busy the last couple of days. We had a birthday party Saturday and then went to Home Depot and TSC to price fencing for around the garden. Chad is going to Home Depot today to pick up all the needed supplies and hopefully we can get it done this week. We finally got the pine trees down and cut up and got all the branches thrown into the trench on the side of our property. We also trimmed up all the cedar trees in the side yards and got up all of the damage from the snow storm. The yard looks much better. We still have one that is too big to manage and a friend of ours is going to let us borrow his tractor this week so that we can push everything left into the trench and also get a dump truck load of mulch spread in the flower beds, around the trees, around the chicken run/coop/rabbit hutch, and on the kid's playground. Whew, I'm tired just thinking about all that mulching to be done!

Today it is beautiful outside and I got 4 loads of laundry on the line and cleaned all the composted leaf litter/chicken poo out of the chicken run from the winter and put it in the raised beds. I also put all the rabbit poo I could get in there too. We still have to get the soil for the beds but I figured that while it was nice I would go on and put this in there and mix everything together later. I went into the woods behind the house and got 4 more wheelbarrows of leaves to replace what I took out of the run. I figure that if I leave the leaves in there for the spring/summer and then take everything out in the fall and put into the raised beds again it will compost nicely over the winter. I think that all the little bits are going to help with loosening up the soil when we put it in. It has been in the run for a few months now so it is really good and broken up and of course there is the added benefit of the poo.

I also had to move all of our trash cans to make way for the dump truck that will come sometime in the next 3 days...probably in the middle of a rainstorm

Well, just chilling out now, relaxing and eating popcorn and letting the kids watch Cinderella before daddy gets home and we go out to play and finish the laundry. Have a good day everyone!

edited for spelling

 

[PamsPride]

Ok, I will totally take rain over snow anyday!!

That is awesome that you found a local homeschooling group for support!

I agree...if grandma wants to buy the property your mom needs to keep her nose out of it! How exciting to be able to buy 15 acres and then build!

You sure have been busy!!

 

[lorihadams]

I'm trying.....now if I can just figure out my sewing machine! I'm not used to one with a brain and all the bells and whistles...

 

[keljonma]

I hate when the sewing machine is smarter than me!

You'll get it - just take your time!

 

[lorihadams]

You should have seen me when the sales girl told me to "test drive" it. I reached around the back of the presser foot to put it down! She just gave me this look like "oh, honey, welcome to the 21st century" Then she showed me the button to lower the presser foot....ugh. I've got a lot of practicing to do!

 

[lorihadams]

Tuesday

not doing too much today....children both woke up with runny noses and coughing a little so I have kept them inside until later in the day when it is warmer. Chad got all the supplies for the fence yesterday...for $98!!! I don't know what he did but I'm glad, for once, that I sent him shopping! He got a roll of 100 ft of fencing, 5 4x4x8 wooden posts, 3or 4 2x4s for the gate, 6 metal t-posts, hinges, and a tape measure. Not bad! He even got everything put up last night except the gate. We are planning on finishing it tonight. I'll post a pic when we're done. Hopefully the mulch won't come till later after Chad gets home cause he forgot to move my papa's trailer out of the way before he went to work this morning and he took the truck so I can't move it

I am trying to decide whether I want to put my beans in the big beds or build a smaller bed for them with a teepee for them to climb on. I also want to plant pumpkins, little ones for pies and pumpkin butter, and I was wondering if I could make a small bed for them too and train them to a trellis or teepee. Has anyone done this? I may post another thread for this somewhere else.....hmmmm